Saying “This isn’t racist because it is based off of a similar meme that originated in China” has big “I can’t be racist when I say the N-word because I have a black friend.” energy.
It’s less that and more “ohh, it’s fine when they say it, but when I say it, it’s racist” which isn’t reasonable in the first place for the n-word, but doubly so in this case since we know there’s a lot of racism going around in the HK independence “movement.”
I challenged this notion with a lib the other day.
The watermelon originated in Africa. That doesn’t mean that the vile caricaturised depictions of black people eating watermelons is somehow not inherently racist.
You can also look to the origin and continuing usage of the swastika, especially in Asian cultures, as another example here - you aren’t going to tell me that the right-angled unicode swastika being used by westerners on the internet isn’t done in service of fascism 99% of the time.
And on that matter, don’t let erm-ackshually dorks tell you that the 90 degree swastika wasn’t used by Nazis and isn’t representative of them. One of the most famous depictions of the Nazi swastika is a right angled one:
“The watermelon originated in Africa. That doesn’t mean that the vile caricaturised depictions of black people eating watermelons is somehow not inherently racist.”
That’s not what is happening here tho. You can’t claim that every cartoon where a black person interacted with a watermelon is racist.
Just like here you can’t claim it just cuz the character is yellow it is racist.
Pooh is used cuz dude looks like Pooh… Not cuz he’s yellow.
The fact that Pooh is yellow too doesn’t suddenly make it racist.
Saying “This isn’t racist because it is based off of a similar meme that originated in China” has big “I can’t be racist when I say the N-word because I have a black friend.” energy.
It’s less that and more “ohh, it’s fine when they say it, but when I say it, it’s racist” which isn’t reasonable in the first place for the n-word, but doubly so in this case since we know there’s a lot of racism going around in the HK independence “movement.”
I challenged this notion with a lib the other day.
The watermelon originated in Africa. That doesn’t mean that the vile caricaturised depictions of black people eating watermelons is somehow not inherently racist.
You can also look to the origin and continuing usage of the swastika, especially in Asian cultures, as another example here - you aren’t going to tell me that the right-angled unicode swastika being used by westerners on the internet isn’t done in service of fascism 99% of the time.
And on that matter, don’t let erm-ackshually dorks tell you that the 90 degree swastika wasn’t used by Nazis and isn’t representative of them. One of the most famous depictions of the Nazi swastika is a right angled one:
https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/1214749781387436032/pu/vid/450x360/o0Nxlts0lffM8lUv.mp4
“The watermelon originated in Africa. That doesn’t mean that the vile caricaturised depictions of black people eating watermelons is somehow not inherently racist.”
That’s not what is happening here tho. You can’t claim that every cartoon where a black person interacted with a watermelon is racist.
Just like here you can’t claim it just cuz the character is yellow it is racist.
Pooh is used cuz dude looks like Pooh… Not cuz he’s yellow. The fact that Pooh is yellow too doesn’t suddenly make it racist.